


You That Shall Cross From Shore To Shore

by justanotherStonyfan



Series: Banned Together Fills [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Chronic Illness, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Marijuana, POV Bucky Barnes, POV Second Person, Period-Typical Homophobia, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Recreational Drug Use, Self-Medication
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-11
Updated: 2020-07-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:48:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25194922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justanotherStonyfan/pseuds/justanotherStonyfan
Summary: “Here you go,” you say, soft - and he gives you the eye like he doesn’t like your tone, but you love him, so funny looks be damned.He takes it with a nod of thanks and you pluck an ashtray from the counter, take your jacket off while you’re over there. You sit beside him and you make it look easy but you make sure not to jostle him, not to jumble him about. He’s not pathetic, he ain’t a burden, but he’s not well yet, and he’s tired and sore, and his stomach’s been too temperamental to want something in it.You strike up a match.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Series: Banned Together Fills [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1825168
Comments: 17
Kudos: 72
Collections: Banned Together Bingo 2020





	You That Shall Cross From Shore To Shore

**Author's Note:**

> My new First-Submission for the Banned Together Bingo 2020, to fill my **'Drug Use'** square.

“You get it?” he asks, and you know how bad it’s gotta be that it's the first thing he asks you.

Nonchalance ain’t a good fit on a face like his, never is when he gets like this.

“I got it,” you tell him, proud and smiling, patting your breast pocket like a secret even though the door is closed behind you.

This you can provide for him, this small help you can offer. And his long lashes flutter, a sigh passes lips that always look like they’ve been painted so red. (He sucks his paintbrushes to points and sometimes they really are painted, but they look like this painted or not.) He doesn’t say ‘thank goodness’ or any little thing like that, but you can read it in his posture, in the hunch of his sloping shoulders, the bowing of his head. Hurt weighs heavy on him, drags his limbs downward, but your old, tattered couch is good enough, a good place, as good as any. 

The sun’s coming in slanted low, and paints gold bars on the worn floor. The curtains don’t keep the light out much, though he’s closed them, the threadbare weave letting bright needles of swirling dust through. It’s not quite stifling in here but it’s not far off. 

You smile as you pass him, touch a hand to his shoulder - only light ‘cause he can’t take more than light, and he lifts his hand to yours where it sits there, closes purple-lidded eyes and breathes for a moment or two.

“How’d you get on today?” he says, and his voice is clear or you wouldn’t have gone for the green - you’d have stretched him out face-down on the bed instead and set about using your hands to ease some ache. 

Maybe you still will, depends how good the stuff is, but you’re not too worried - Donnelley’s never let you down before.

“Pretty good,” you tell him, work today was no better or worse than it ever is - it’s easy work for you. You’ve strength and stamina and, for most of Brooklyn’s dock work, that’s all you need. You got brains, of course, but you don’t need those to heft and tote. “Wanna make one yourself?”

“Naw, you roll,” Steve says, and his voice is low and slurred, one arm on the arm of the couch - you’ve lived with him a good couple years now, and you both lived in each others’ pockets before that; it’s not hard to hear when he’s outta steam, nor when he’s aching.

Steve, your Stevie, he’s getting better. It’s been a hard week - he has them often and then, subsequently, so do you - but he’s coming back to himself. Ain’t hungry still, feels weak and unhappy, aches in places he’d rather not, but that’s how it always is, and that’s why you’re here, why you brought the reefer. Rolling some for him’s simple, easy - you can make like you’re not being careful, though you are - always are for him.

You’re happy with your handiwork when it’s done, lick it closed and pinch it right. You’ve a book of matches in your back pocket, and you open up a window first - otherwise you’ll cloud the place and flood the building and there’s no faster way to get in trouble than that. 

“Here you go,” you say, soft - and he gives you the eye like he doesn’t like your tone, but you love him, so funny looks be damned. 

He takes it with a nod of thanks and you pluck an ashtray from the counter, take your jacket off while you’re over there. You sit beside him and you make it look easy but you make sure not to jostle him, not to jumble him about. He’s not pathetic, he ain’t a burden, but he’s not well yet, and he’s tired and sore, and his stomach’s been too temperamental to want something in it.

You strike up a match.

Christmas, that’s matches. Always Christmas - your mother lights the candles on the tree each year and the struck-match-smell of it takes you back to the years you barely remember, every time. 

“Here,” you says soft, and you block the sun between you as you bring your heads together, but the amber glow lights his eyes and casts the shadow of his brow across his forehead.

The first breath is hardest, as always. He gets a lungful as his eyes cut up to you, and then his brow furrows, a dark line above the bridge of his nose. The corners of his eyes wrinkle and his mouth pinches tight, and then he turns his head away from you fast - a sputter first that’ll climb to a scrape, a gasp as it’s more of an itch than he’s got breath to scratch, and then his cheeks flush red and his eyes squeeze shut as there’s silence. One second, and another, and then he fills his lungs and coughs, a grating wrench of every muscle before he takes the breath to do it again. It’s hard and deep, not that he can stop it, and he gives a third, but then his chest heaves a moment, his expression softer, and he breathes open-mouthed and half-exhausted. 

He clears his throat another moment later and looks to you.

“Go on,” you tell him - you know that by now his ears will ring, that by now the blood in his face is making him dizzy.

It’s faster if he coughs anyway, he’ll be alright in a moment. 

The second drag is easier, he just clears his throat and he’s done with it, and then he settles back into the couch and looks at the joint and the glowing lit end of it.

He takes a third drag and holds his breath, and tips his head against the back of the couch to stare at their ceiling. When his eyes close again, his hand lowers, and he blows a steady stream of smoke into the heavy air.

Then his hand lifts just a little, out to you, and you take it from him because he wants you to have it, because you want to take it. 

It’s not as harsh as his coughing would suggest, but then anything’ll set off those lungs. It settles at the back of your throat, on your tongue. 

When Steve gets sick, it’s not a piecemeal thing. He doesn’t get a sore throat or a dicky stomach. He gets sick the way he does everything else - the whole hog. You act like it don’t bother you, like it’s a sure thing he’ll pull through, but every time you’re praying for his life. Every time you’re terrified of what might happen. But you keep a smile on your face and cajole through the coughs and the fevers, and so far prayer and optimism’s worked well enough. A cold or a fever or a chill will knock him down for weeks - he won’t stay down in back alleys or parking lots so it makes sense there’d be _something_ that’ll do it, you only wish it weren’t so much left to chance that he’ll live to fight another day. But it hurts him in a way it can’t hurt you. 

His bones ain’t right, his lungs neither, nor his blood. His eyes and ears don’t work and, here’s the thing - that’s just Steve. Flat feet and bent spine, it don’t bother you as long as it don’t bother him, but the things that make him sick make those things worse, and those things make his being sick worse, too. He’ll ache for days yet, joints and bones made painful by the sickness, skin made tender though it’s so thin and pale already. Dizziness lingers because he can’t get air enough to stand half the time anyways, because they can’t get food enough to eat half the time anyways. His eyes strain and his head pounds and his big hands curl in fists as he fights to pretend like it don’t mean nothing, but you see it, you know. 

And you can’t get to a Doctor if you ain’t got the money for it, can’t always get the money for it if he ain’t fit for work. You save when you’re earning, both of you, and then you spend when he’s sick. That’s what it’s there for, of course, that doesn’t concern you, but you don’t have enough for a Doctor’s visit. But you had enough for one of these.

“Oh,” Steve says, but he says it soft, like the way books tell you summer rain makes goosebumps on your skin.

It doesn’t rain like that in Brooklyn, but you’re pretty sure you know the feeling. 

You’ll get a glass a water for your cotton-wool mouth soon enough, but you clear your throat because you heard from Mrs Byrne’s boys that thing about coughing gets you there faster. It works, you think, but maybe that’s just the knowing of it. It’s probably all just in your mind. You look at him but then you find a different man beside you on the couch. That’s what that sound was for, that soft little sigh.

It never takes long, not for someone Steve’s size, and so there he is, spread out on the couch like he’s been stretched out to dry there, eyes closed without that furrow between them, brows turned upward in the middle. He doesn’t smile, but his mouth ain’t pinched no more, just open and slack with relief. He breathes slow, and easier than you’ve heard for a while, hands loose where one’s on the arm of the couch and the other's down in his lap. There’s air between his chest and the shirt ‘cause of how thin he is, but you can see the movement anyway. You’ve never seen a man show something as clearly as Steve Rogers shows relief, at least when it’s just the two of you.

His eyes crack open, and they glitter through his lashes. 

You hand it over without a word and he takes it, just as silently. Another drag, another two, and he ain’t coughing no longer, just a deep sigh.

“You keep it,” he says, and you love when you’re both of you like this. 

You take the joint back and he runs a hand over himself, chest to stomach. He turns his head away and goes still. He ain’t sleeping but, for the first time that you’ve seen in almost fourteen days, he really could be. Long column of his pale throat, the black suspenders that cinch a graying, too-big-for-him shirt, like the poets you read about - all frills and dreams - he _rests_.

You put the joint out halfway through - there’s plenty left and maybe he’ll feel the need for it tomorrow, but you don’t need any more of it now. 

“Hmm,” he says, barely any sound at all, and you watch him, watch him breathing, watch him resting. 

There are many things, you think suddenly, in his life that could be death knells. Sometimes you hear him clear his throat in the kitchen while you’re dressing in the bedroom, sometimes he walks home in the rain, but sometimes it’s other things too. Way things are happening in Europe, you can’t say a word against your country when you’re out - shouldn’t anyways if you know what’s good for you. Doesn’t stop Steve. With Steve the way he is, he oughtn’t start fights - oughtn’t, but does. With love the way you two are, you both have to be careful what you say or do if you can be seen, but moreso for Steve. It’s always moreso for Steve. You’re pretty sure it wouldn’t stop him anyway, were it not for the fact that he’d be taking you down with him if he got all stubborn about it. He can yell ‘you wanna take this outside?’ at some fella he’s cussin’ out, but ain’t nobody gonna turn a blind eye if he plants one on you in the middle of Brooklyn. 

And if the two of you get known for it, ain’t no surprise who’d get pulled into an alley, and there’s no guarantee you’d find him in time. Half of you hates it.

It stretches too far, too, that fear. Like shadows that creep despite the little candle flame. He doesn’t show affection anywhere unless your doors are locked, your curtains drawn. It’s whispered voices or nothing at all.

But this, like this, after this…

You’re happy to wait. Any little crumbs he drops, you pick them up. You can’t save them to feast later but you can enjoy what gets given. Loving him is dangerous for you, but loving you’s more dangerous for him. You, yourself, you could pass it off, you know you could. Tell someone you were drunk, tell someone they’re wrong about what they saw, but Steve? If he slipped a little, he’d be given no ground and that’d be an end to it. You try not to think about how death’s a shadow on him on any given day.

But he’s different in private. He’s different with you when he can be _with you._ You hurt for him, really - he’s had to have so much caution he’s forgotten how to love without it - but losing the pain helps. Being a little easier in his skin, having a little less on his mind, a little less ache in his bones, that makes him sweet, sweet as you know he can be. 

“Mh,” he says, and then his head turns back, slow, frowning, like he’s looking for something, and your heart swells when his dark eyes, pupils huge behind narrowed eyelids, find your own.

The corner of his mouth slides upward, slow too, and his lashes sweep down once, twice. And then he lifts the arm closest to you.

It’s an invitation he can’t often extend, and you move as carefully as you can to keep from jolting him, or making him think twice. 

“ ‘M’ere,” he says, as though he needs to explain it to you, and you’re careful of him not because he’s fragile - fragile is the farthest thing from what he is - but because he aches and he’s tired and you want him to look back on this fondly so you can make sure he’ll do it again. 

Tucking yourself up against his side isn’t as hard as you used to think it would be, and he can take the weight of your head on his chest because of what you’ve given him, can breathe past your arm over his stomach. His arm comes down across your shoulders, barely spanning it, but it doesn’t need to wrap you tight, it never has. He hates most of what he is, you know that much, even if he doesn’t admit it. When he says _I can do it myself,_ and _I can make it that far_ and _I can get by on my own,_ you can hear what he means by it, and you wish he could love himself the way you love him. He doesn’t need to be taller than you, or stronger than you, or older than you. You just want his arm across your shoulders, his fingers in your hair. You want him sprawled across the couch with the confidence he should have all the time, and you count yourself lucky there’s something you can give him to get it. 

You look at him from where you are, tilt your head up just a little, and you can see affection curves his lips, warms his expression. He longs to change your places - to be stronger, taller, to be the protector. You know he doesn’t need the first two to be the third, ‘cause he’s there already. You let yourself be small with him, you don’t have to be the charmer, the gentleman. 

“Better?” you say, soft, and he answers you-

“Mmm…” 

-with his voice strong and deep but just as soft, and you’re glad. Wherever you are, the two of you, you want _better_ for him. 

You open the buttons - it’s an old shirt of yours, like all of his shirts - and your fingers aren’t always better than his at smallwork, but he’s sated now, sinking slowly into comfort and slipping slowly out of the everyday, and you want skin under your palm. He is bird-boned and iron-willed, like his mother was, and you consider him precious though he’d hate to hear it. He lets you touch, in part because you love him and he loves you too, in part because his limbs are heavy and his neck is pliant, and the cushions cradle both of you where you drift together.

The love between you is a quiet, frightened thing, kept in shadows lest it be broken in the light. His body can’t always give you what he thinks it should, but he's far more bothered by what he can't do than you'll ever be. His pain is fading, and the exhaustion of another sickness you couldn’t prevent comes up to meet you both and pull you right back down. You shut your eyes and listen to his unsteady heart, and you know you’ve never heard one kinder. His breathing evens and the afternoon lengthens, and you keep your palm beneath the layers of that old shirt of yours, where he’s pale and warm and dappled with freckles like navigable constellations. You find your way home on his skin.

**Author's Note:**

> The title for this fic is “You That Shall Cross From Shore To Shore” for a number of reasons - firstly, I like to think of Steve and Bucky metaphorically crossing from shore to shore, having left their own time to come to ours. Secondly, the poem the line comes from is Walt Whitman’s ‘Crossing Brooklyn Ferry’ which I felt was pretty apt for these two. And thirdly, the poem is from the collection “leaves of grass” because Weed. 
> 
> Fun facts that are completely irrelevant: I accidentally wrote at least two lines that fit to Dolly Parton’s “Jolene,” which appears to have happened because I listened to the song at one point while I was writing. 
> 
> I won’t be mentioning which lines,  
> but I’m sure they’re not hard to find;  
> just keep the tune inside your head(, Jolene).


End file.
